Our nephew and his fiance, Chris & Hayley, came up to visit and have a little break just after Christmas. We had an excellent dinner and drinks at the Italian restaurant one night and they got out for a couple of dives and some fishing with Dave one day and brought back some good fish. It was a late one by the time they got around to packing it all up for the trip back to Perth
We had a late open on New Year's Day at the dive shop, so I headed out for two morning dives with Ross and Mary. I really enjoyed both of them, despite some pretty sub-average conditions on the first site. The second site was just magic - great visibility, incredible activity, no current and little surge. I played around with shooting some subjects I don't normally spend much time with and overall just enjoyed the heck out of being underwater. After those two dives, I had to jump ship in the middle of the Gulf so I could guide some of the dive shop divers on our two afternoon reef dives so it turned in to a long day on the water!
01 - royal damsel
02 -
03 - yellow boxfish
04 - whitetip reef shark. These guys must have been mating because the big female was circling around and around, then would crash land onto the sand where a small male would come close to her and off she'd go again. There was a little bumping going on and she clearly wasn't interested in the whole affair; she just really wanted to be left alone.
05 - Chromodoris geometricas laying eggs. I found this pair on the second dive.
06 - On the third dive, I found the egg spiral, but the two nudibranchs had moved off. I found one a very long ways from the eggs and couldn't find the other at all.
07 - there was a whole school of batfish under the boat on the second dive and they weren't shy about getting close!
As usual, there was no shortage of cleaning action
08 - goatfish
09 - rankin cod
10 - big eye trevally
11 - The tiger cardinalfish are brooding their eggs again
Some more cutie fishes
12 - Gold-banded butterfly fish, juvenile
13 - Fiery damsel, adult. When these guys are juveniles, their backs are bright red or orange. Still pretty when they grow up!
On the other end of the spectrum, there were lots of creatures with good camouflage, too
14 - crocodilefish
15 - scorpionfish
16 - we see a lot of these little gobies guarding their holes as a shrimp cleans house, but I've never seen (or noticed, maybe) one of these stripey shrimp before
And the not so subtle
17 - Gymnodoris rubropapulosa
18 - Hypselodoris bullockii
19 - and some beautiful orangey-pinky soft coral
Dave has had to drive down to Coral Bay for work stuff today so I am in the dive centre wishing the air-conditioners would at least pretend to keep up with the over 40C degree day we're having. I have a meeting with one of my April brides later tonight and have a few new enquiries to follow up, too.
I think 2009 is going to be great! So far we're off to a good start ;)
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